Laurie Boris's Blog, page 32

He’ll Be First: Two-minute Fiction

Something funny is happening on JD Mader’s website, Unemployed Imagination. Writers show up on Fridays. We write short fiction (two minutes’ worth, normally) and post our succulent delights in the comments. But…something is happening over there. Like when our heads are turned, the bar taps up a notch. We inspire each other. And it’s fun. Fun is good. Remember fun? Here are a couple of my recent two-minute entries. We don’t edit (much). We barely proofread. The blood on the floor is still fresh. Watch where you’re walking. Maybe next Friday, you’ll stop by and give the timer a spin.

—

The boy is still standing on the corner staring off into nothing when I come out of the supermarket, struggling to lift a ten-pound bag of kitty litter from the cart into the trunk of my car. Why isn’t he helping me with this? Boys are supposed to offer to do shit like this for little old ladies, right? But he isn’t moving, the lazy ass kid. Why don’t people teach their kids better? I felt my shoulder pull from the weight, the same shoulder I’d hurt last year but never healed right. And he just stands there all slouchy, pants halfway down his ass, eyes glazed like his brains have leaked out from the hot afternoon. I will not deign to ask for his help, nor offer him money. I carry on with my business and drive away. Another one for the list, I think, checking him off in my head. No. He’ll be first.

—-

Bored and self-destructively curious, I seek him out. The photo doesn’t resemble the dude I remember. The photo looks like his father, a pyramid of a man with ham-sized shoulders and a bare, wrinkled scalp. The man now staring at me from my screen is similarly bald, the years roadmapped on his face like a mountain of trouble. The eyes are not the color I remember, a blue so fair he reminded people of a Disney hero. Maybe he had them retouched to show the proper gravitas for an artist of his imagined caliber. Maybe he has contact lenses to change the color, I don’t know and discover, with great relief, that I don’t much care anymore. He is someone else’s problem now, someone else’s albatross, someone else’s worst nightmare.

Offensive Stock Photography

I just spent the last few hours researching images for my next book cover. It’s a contemporary romance with gay male protagonists, a sequel to a novella I published a few months ago. For that cover, I went with an image of midtown Manhattan because it captured what I wanted.

For this one, call me crazy, but instead of a pure scenic, I’d hoped to find a picture of an actual human with a strong resemblance to one of my guys. (No, it’s not my feathered friend over here, but he’s pretty angry, too.)

When I went hunting, I popped in search terms that I thought would bring up images of two men, or even one man, and a hint that there were some deep emotions going on. An eye lock, holding hands, huddled underneath an umbrella, having coffee, brooding while watching the rain… You know, the sorts of things most couples in romance-novel conflict do that you could put on a book cover that doesn’t imply you’re getting the racier variety of gay contemporary novel. I have no problem with M/M style stories; it’s just not what I’m doing for this one.

What I found made me angry. Stereotypes abounded. There were guys in drag or putting on makeup, half-naked men wrapped in rainbow flags, and nearly every couple had their shirts off, were striking some sort of comical pose, looked like the “Men on Film” guys Damon Wayans and David Grier portrayed on In Living Color, or were touching their toes in their underwear. I appreciate the aesthetic of a half-naked man—hey, I’m female and still have a pulse, but what bothered me was the presumption that to your average stock-photo hunter, this is what “homosexual couple” represents. That it’s all about the sexuality. When I put in “heterosexual couple,” I get happy, smiling men and women out on dates, snapping selfies, bringing flowers, and for the most part, fully clothed and not twisted into pretzels. Why the difference?

Can we talk about this? Because I’m at a loss. And kind of pissed off about it, to tell you the truth.

Saturday Night Poetry: Falling

When I’m jittery and the words pile up in my head, sometimes I need a little focus. A little prompt. A little card from the magic box of possibilities. I have such a box, which I bought a long time ago from a woman at a writers conference. Sometimes I pluck a card and it speaks to me. This one spoke to me today. Probably because I’ve been staring at this book cover for the last week or so. Today’s prompt is: “As quickly as you can, make a list beginning with the line I remember falling…“

Step off the ledge with me? I can’t promise it will all be good, because I don’t dare call myself a poet, but you might like the way the wind rushes through your hair.

I Remember Falling…

I remember falling for a boy from Liverpool who made me laugh when I needed it most.

I remember falling in love with a lacy purple top I couldn’t afford but purchased anyway.

I remember falling from the up-end of the teeter-totter when the bullies jumped away.

I remember falling for all the wrong reasons and getting up for half of the right ones.

I remember falling savage-hard for a man who wore Aramis and gray flannel suits.

I remember falling out of love with a way of life that I’d been trained to accept as gospel.

I remember falling ass-over-teacups for a blue-eyed boy who tried to break my spirit.

I remember falling fast for a frat guy with a smooth line, an easy smile, and a fiancée.

I remember falling out of line and getting cold-shouldered into girl-world invisibility.

I remember falling for a pair of sharp white shoes that pinched my wallet and my toes.

I remember falling into place while juggling and dancing on the edge of disaster.

I remember falling sideways with the wind into the crook of the devil’s eyebrow.

I remember falling in line until I found the courage to take the last exit in New Jersey.

I remember falling down, getting up, falling down, getting up, lather, rinse, repeat.

I remember falling off my high horse into a steaming pile of my own harsh words.

I remember falling backward into a pair of arms that turned out to be the wrong ones.

I remember falling into unrequited lust with the man a roommate shoved into my closet.

I remember falling out of favor and crying rivers until I realized that it didn’t matter.

I remember falling from grace and getting up as if I’d meant to do that the whole time.

Entangled Thorns by Melinda Clayton: Book Review

By accident I started reading Melinda Clayton’s Cedar Hollow series out of order, but it didn’t reduce the experience for me in the slightest. After the well-defined characters, what I like most about this series is how the sense of place becomes a character as well. It feels especially powerful in Entangled Thorns. I can almost smell Rugged Creek and feel the shock of the cold water and hear the whine of the mosquitoes. The vegetation, the land, the very humidity in the air…I can practically taste it. And yet it doesn’t become overwhelming or feel like too much detail. I know when I start highlighting passages on my Kindle about the quality of the sunsets or the texture of the night skies, it’s something I’ll be hard pressed to put down. 

This book is an intense, skillfully meted out narrative about two sisters who escaped Cedar Hollow in their teens and then lost touch. Now, with their mother in poor shape, they are summoned home, and must decide whether to return and face the horrors they’d fled. And the different women they’ve become.

Of course, it wouldn’t be much of a story if the sisters didn’t return. Chapter by chapter, the characters reveal their lives, their thoughts, and pulled me in deeper and deeper. Right to that place where I needed to keep reading to find out what happens next.

I really liked the care Ms. Clayton used in making the characters unique and compelling. Even the minor characters, like Beth’s husband, Mark, were fleshed out in a way that held a mirror up to the protagonists, showing bits previously hidden.

Looking forward to reading the second book next, and I’m looking forward to more after that. (I hope there will be more!)

The Case Against Author Solutions, Part 1: The Numbers

laurieboris:

If you get “courted” by any of these folks, run fast and run far…

Originally posted on David Gaughran:

The more you study an operation like Author Solutions, the more it resembles a two-bit internet scam, except on a colossal scale.

Internet scammers work on percentages. They know that only a tiny fraction of people will get hoodwinked so they flood the world’s inboxes with spammy junk.

While reputable self-publishing services can rely on author referrals and word-of-mouth, Author Solutions is forced to take a different approach. According to figures released by Author Solutions itself when it was looking for a buyer in 2012, it spent a whopping $11.9m on customer acquisition in 2011 alone.

This money is spent on:

Paying bloggers, websites, and companies a “bounty” based on how many writers they can deliver to Author Solutions.
Buying a huge presence at writers’ events such as the Toronto Word on the Street Festival the Miami Book Fair International, and the LA Times Festival of…

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Do You Know How To Edit AND Proofread Your Story?

laurieboris:

Check out this article by Jenny Hansen about editing and proofreading, including some handy tips for self-editing. Highly recommended!

Originally posted on Writers In The Storm Blog:

by Jenny Hansen, @JennyHansenCA

Editing and Proofreading: Two separate processes that equal one great story.

Like most writers, I hang out with a boatload of other writers. Still, I never saw much of other peoples’ works in progress until I coordinated a contest several years ago. Coordinating contests changed the way I see writing. Period. It was a window into both sides of the submission process.

Plus, I saw firsthand one of the important talents that separates the amateurs from the professionals: the ability to both edit and proofread.

In novel-writing, editing is King and proofreading is Queen.

Professional writers, whether published or pre-published know: You never get a second chance to make a first impression.They work hard to make a great first impression.

As a contest coordinator, I had to read every piece of paper sent between the judges and the contestants to ensure everyone played nice with each other. (It should…

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Stiletto Signature: Flash Fiction

Did you know that every Friday afternoon, the awesomeness on a stick that is JD Mader opens up his website to YOUR flash fiction? Yep. Depending on his delightfully evil whim, he’ll set a time limit, but it’s usually two minutes. Don’t worry about editing, spelling, if it makes any sense…it’s a great writing exercise to keep the muscles loose and the words flowing. Here are three that I put up last Friday and here’s a link to all of them. It’s a lot of fun and SO much great reading. If you like to write, come play with us one week!

I think I was angry when I wrote these. And it was raining. Coupled with some kind of Facebook quiz that told me my secret nickname is Stiletto. I didn’t know if that meant as in the blade or the shoes. I’ve never had the blade, nor the desire, and maybe wore the shoes once before I turned my ankle. Anyway…

—–

You don’t need a weapon to kill. All it takes is a look, a word, a wave of a hand, a signature on a form. You can mark me off as surplus goods, you can load me onto a wooden pallet and shrink wrap me and mail me off to the auxiliary office in Katmandu, it is a way of killing without a gun or blade. Just render me redundant, leave me off in the parking lot, erase my name from payroll and I’m as good as gone. So why go back? Easy. To get what is owed. And you look like I’ve gone crazy, like you should call security and have me once again removed from the premises. Hah. You can do that all day long but you can’t remove my spirit, you can’t eliminate my secrets, you can’t shut me up.

—–

You’ll never feel the knife go in until you see the glistening tip sticking out the other side. You won’t notice because you’re falling asleep in front of the hockey game. You won’t notice because the whiskey numbs the pain. You won’t notice because there is food in the fridge and the lights turn on and the hair dryer works. You won’t notice because you’re a good two tracks behind the album of my life, and I’ll be long gone before you get to the flip side. You’ll wonder where to find the light switch, and the electric company’s phone number, and the key that never fit the front door to begin with. You’ll wonder why it’s so quiet at night and why the bed is so empty and why the cat doesn’t have any food. Because she’s the only one who’ll notice that I’m gone.

—–

We leaned on the railing overlooking the catwalk after hours and made plans, easing the overtime stress, laughing away the ridiculous deadlines. You were going to become a yuppie in Connecticut, drive a BMW, marry a Kennedy. I had no idea what was coming next, but this sure wasn’t it. Hearing the inhale and exhale of machinery night after night, the last one out of the building, the last one of the last ones who used to like each other, before the entire cast changed. You said that when you finally arced, everyone would know it, because you’d be driving the forklift. I only drove one in my imagination, into a plate-glass wall, just to feel in my bones how it would sound.

Flash Fiction Win!

I entered Indies Unlimited’s Flash Fiction Challenge this week because the topic, put up on Mother’s Day weekend, spoke to me: Write a story about your mother. This bit immediately came to mind. And it won, which means the story gets to be in the 2014 Flash Fiction Anthology. You can find the link to the IU page and KS Brooks’ lovely photo here.

The story:

My mother owned Thanksgiving. She shooed us from the kitchen to watch the Macy’s Parade, waved off our offers to help, busied our small, sticky hands with gingerbread man production. Her children happily entertained by the Bullwinkle blimp, she made everything from scratch, her mouth growing tense as the oven timer counted down to Norman Rockwell Judgment Day.

Finally a grown woman with my own household, I wanted to ease her burden. Could I take over something? Maybe…cranberries? Several times she denied me. I kept asking. She would allow me to pick up cream on the way to her house. Wash dishes afterward. It wasn’t enough, though. One year, overwhelmed perhaps with stepsons, grandchildren, and family illnesses, she hesitated after I begged for cranberry detail.

“Please. Tell me how you do it.” I thought her magical, how she conjured up the tangy orange cranberry relish. And the sauce! Sparkling in her cut-glass bowls—ruby red and tart-sweet. Surely her cleverness knew no bounds if she could design concoctions so wonderful from a humble bog fruit.

She shrugged. “It’s nothing. I can do it.”

“Seriously. Nothing.” I whipped out pen and paper, prepared to atone for all that I had not learned at my mother’s knee. It had to have been complicated, this secret sauce, possibly requiring exotic ingredients or kitchen gadgetry I had yet to master, but I would do it. “What do I need to buy?”

“Well, cranberries.”

“Obviously. And?”

“And follow the recipes on the bag.”

 

Trailer for The Picture of Cool

Sweet! Brand new trailer for The Picture of Cool. If only writing were as easy as making Animoto videos.

The short novella is available from Amazon.com.

 

Appalachian Justice by Melinda Clayton: a review

Let me tell you about this book. First I need to tell you that Melinda Clayton is a fellow minion at Indies Unlimited. But I’m certain I would have picked up this book regardless, because the subject and the description intrigued me, and I’d heard about her writing talent. I also read a discussion about Appalachian Justice before I read it, mostly concerning the dialect used. Dialect is dicey in fiction. There’s a fine tightrope act between “not enough” and “Jar Jar Binks.” (No offense meant to Star Wars fans.) But dialect can come off a little strong and alienate a reader, sometimes because it can be difficult to understand, sometimes because it can touch a stereotypical nerve. And, I admit that when I started reading Appalachian Justice, it took me a bit to get into the West Virginia dialect used in first person by the main character, Billy May Platte. But after a while, I grew comfortable with her manner of speaking and grew to love her for her quiet strength and authenticity.

The events of the story are not always pretty, but neither is real life, and the author does a fine job portraying these “broken” characters, laying out who they are through their dialogue and actions and allowing the reader to have empathy. I felt so strongly for these characters, the ones who were trying to get on with their lives after some horrifying experiences, the ones just trying do good and right old wrongs, some only going by the limited information they were able to glean from each other. I loved how Ms. Clayton handled Billy May’s sexuality: it was just a fact of the character’s life, although very realistically for the time period and the community, other characters saw it as a threat.

Appalachian Justice is a great example of how a skilled writer can bend writing “rules” and make it work. Ms. Clayton mixes first and third person, employs multiple points of view even for minor characters, goes back and forth in time, and it all works, in my opinion, to give the reader a full context for the core drama that runs through the story. I love how the story builds in tension and how the author metes it out, pulling me in deeper and deeper until I had to stay up far past my bedtime to see how it all came together. Once I got hooked I had a hard time putting this down. Now I’m on the hunt for Melinda Clayton’s other books.